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Michael Bisping: I cannot lose this fight

Just a couple of hours before the fight now, and I am ready to stop the talking and start fighting Alan Belcher at UFC 159 here in New Jersey. I feel great, not putting on any weight since my last fight in January certainly helped me fully concentrate on working on my skill set rather than working up a sweat to lose weight.

I’m about to weigh-in now but I could have made weight literally weeks ago. I held myself back, didn’t over-train, which I’ve been guilty of in the past. I can’t wait for the fight Saturday night.

Belcher says he's got no respect for me as a person, despite never having met me, but I couldn’t care less what this redneck thinks of me. I thought his video of him super-imposing his face on Dan Henderson’s knocking me out laughing was completely unprofessional. He’s never fought anyone near the caliber of a Dan Henderson and for him to laugh at a fellow athlete is pathetic.

Maybe I am right, maybe I am wrong, but that really pissed me off and I cannot wait to put a beatdown on this guy now. He doesn’t respect me as a person but he damn well WILL respect me as a fighter after I beat him into a pool of his own spit and blood in the center of the Octagon at UFC 159. He’s not on my level. He good at a lot of things, he’s a little bigger than me, he has decent striking and some submissions but I’ve never seen anything special from him.

His striking is okay, that is it. It is okay. He’s not this huge puncher he keeps claiming he is. He thinks he’s this Thai Boxing master because he once got a suntan in Thailand and wears bad Thai shorts.

I respect him as an athlete and opponent, he’s got tools, but where he cannot compete – and the reason he cannot beat me – is all mental. A big part of the fight game is mental strength, pushing through being tired, and that’s why he gets beaten by guys like Jason Day who I beat inside one round. He mentally crumbles when he’s on his back, he quits on himself and stops trying to win when he’s tired.

Losing is not an option here. I will not lose. I will get this idiot, shut his big mouth up for good, and then move on back up the rankings.

I’m totally over my last loss and, to be blunt, I am sick of talking about it and the controversy surrounding it. But I’ve learned from it. I shook up my training, added new things, new people and just like after my other losses, I am coming back better than I was before.

Excuse me if I sound a little aggressive, but now it’s time to back it all up and kick this guy’s arse.

Alan Belcher has been trolling me for years. In a couple of hours he’s going to get what he’s being asking for – and he’s going to get what’s coming to him: a brutal beatdown which he will never, ever forget.

Winning this fight is a must. I cannot lose this. It is all on the line for me and winning is everything.

Getting to a No. 1 contender spot and then losing is not going to be the story of my time in the UFC. I don’t want people in years to come to go “Michael Bisping? Yeah, he had some great lines at press conferences but never fought for the belt." That’s not going to be my legacy.

I am ready to put on a great win, get back to where I was a couple of months ago, and get back up the ladder.